ana
by belladonnanroses
Summary: AU, deals with anorexia from buffy's pov, no spoilers


She'd lost 6 pounds in one week.   
  
Weighing herself on the bathroom scale she smiled at the amount; 80 pounds. Only eighty. Ten pounds back and she had stopped getting her period. Stepping off the scale she turns on the shower, pausing for a moment to savor the feel of the steam against her thin skin. Stripping of her clothes she slips quickly into the shower. She hasn't looked at herself in the mirror for two months.   
  
The warm water sizzles against her skin, dripping into the hollows of her neck and chest. It slides down between her breasts, barely touching them, as it continues down her flat and slightly concave stomach. Enfolding itself in her belly button, it teeters there for a few moments before continuing down past her womanhood, sliding on her sexless hips. Coming to rest on her feet.   
  
Suds follow, smelling faintly of apples and cinnamon. They float around her pale form, popping on instant contact.   
  
Stepping out of the shower she stands nude on her rug, water dripping from the ends of her matted hair. Stepping over to the mirror she rubs away the steam with her elbow before stepping back and staring at herself. Her rib bones are clearly visible right above her stomach, which was taught without any muscle. Her arms are thin and bony, like the frames of a bird's wing. The hollows of her neck deep. Her breasts unbelievably small.   
  
She dropped two cup sizes.   
  
She wears padded wonder bras.   
  
Shivering she stands in the middle of her bathroom, staring at herself in the mirror. Her thin arms wrapped around her dying body, her hair matted and ugly. Bags under her eyes, caved cheeks and a starved look in her eyes. Two hours ago she had thrown up her dinner in the porcelain sink. A dinner she had eaten one-third of before feigning illness. She can still taste the bile in her throat, still feel the heave of her stomach. By now she's an expert and doesn't have to try hard to regurgitate her food.   
  
She drinks lots of water.   
  
Three weeks ago she was hospitalized because of malnutrition. They force fed her through an IV in her arm when she wouldn't take food without throwing it up. Her mother had been there beside her the entire time, tears in her eyes. Her breasts were nearly non existent and she wieghed 75 pounds. They don't let her bathe or piss alone.   
  
Ana. That was what they called it. Not anorexia or bulimia or an eating disorder. They called it Ana.   
  
Buffy's got Ana, be careful not to call it what it really is. Buffy can't deal. Ana.   
  
They look at her funny, take her to McDonalds to eat. She's gained 5 pounds.   
  
Buffy's the Slayer but she's got Ana so lets protect her now. Now that she's in mortal danger, let's make sure Buffy doesn't break. Now that Buffy's already broken.   
  
She was crying.   
  
Gasping sobs that made her ribs creak and joints ache. She struggles to breathe. Every day is a constant struggle. She was hard on the outside just like on the inside. She was joints and bones and nothing else, without muscle and fat. She wasn't become anorexic because she was fat. That had never been the issue. The issue was control. She didn't have enough of it.   
  
Tracing her hand over the pink scar tissue across her wrists she let out another shaky sob. She had cut horizontally. No one had ever told her that you weren't supposed to do it that way. They had found her like that the day she was hospitalized. Bleeding in the bathtub, pink water floating around her and her body shrunken. A thing. It had stopped resembling the body of a woman, her hips were nonexistent and her body was hairless. She blamed it on them.   
  
They controlled her life. People she didn't know, people who didn't give a fuck what she wanted and people who did; people who barely realized that she was human. She was Buffy the Vampire Slayer, after that people failed to realize the scared woman; the woman whose future was dead from the beginning. They had no idea what it was like. The Council tried to kill her, giving her tests and treating her like crap. Like they didn't need her. And her friends? They thought she was invincible, never really understanding how alone she was, how little they supported her. Saint Buffy. She was no saint and every time she fucked up they seemed to pile it on her. Throwing her mistakes in her face and leaving her to deal alone. But they always wanted an ear when they had shit to deal with.   
  
They acted like she wasn't really human.   
  
So she replaced the emptiness and helplessness with pain. The pain she could control, the hunger filled her. They both would have killed her.   
  
Buffy has Ana; they whispered it among themselves like she couldn't hear.   
  
Ana. As if that word could make all the ugliness disappear.   
  
Ana. They still had a lot to learn about ugliness.   
  
Ana. That word didn't even begin to explain it. 


End file.
